THIS TOO SHALL PASS (EDISTO TO INDIANA) (March 24-April 1, 2020)

Our final 9 days on Edisto Island, South Carolina, were spent trying to find a balance between enjoying the island and dreading the time we would have to leave.  The resort was shutting down and our greatly anticipated stay would be shortened from 7 weeks to 18 days.

Not only were we disappointed with the abbreviated stay but, also, were troubled at having to leave the safety of the secluded island and the near empty resort.  It had seemed the best option when leaving Florida.  We would rent a car and drive Edisto, buy food for the duration, and hunker down until the middle of May.  Then, as Covid19 intensified, Wyndham moved to shut down all resorts.

The final two weeks of our time at Ocean Ridge was spent in the Bay Point section.  For the final three days we were the only ones there.  The weather was perfect and temperatures in the mid 70s with plenty of sunshine made the thought of heading north to Indiana less than appealing.

We soaked up the sunshine , the silence , and the solitude while packing and renting a car for the 700 mile drive.  An unexpected consequence of the empty resort was that a family of Bald Eagles joined us at our beach (human beach going had been banned by the South Carolina Governor)

On April 1st we made the long drive to our Indiana cabin in the woods.  The plan is to hide away in hills of southern Indiana as long as we need.  So far, we are healthy and enjoying the coming of spring.

REFLECTIONS

During the last month I have again been made aware of how fragile life is.  We have heard about the death rates of, not just Covid 19  but heart disease, auto accidents, the flu,and many more.  Listening the these numbers tends to make one a fatalist.

The truth is that we will beat this! We will beat this like we have so many other maladies in our  nation's past.  In a book I am currently reading, I read these words concerning the Yellow Fever outbreak in 1797-98.  Sound familiar?

"Cities lost thousands of their residents ......impromptu hospitals were were rigged up at the town's edge to be tended by heroic volunteer nurses .....where every desperate cure was tried on hearsay .....houses were quarantined .....Those who were wealthy enough to possess both transportation and friends elsewhere fled the city."

There was, also, political animosity.  Benjamin Franklin's grandson (a journalist) died from the fever.
Here's what President John Adams wrote.

"He was one of the most notorious libellers of me.  But the Yellow Fever arrested him in his despicable career and sent him to his grandfather from whom he inherited a dirty, envious, jealous, and revengeful spight against me."

The point is that what happened in 1798 sounds a lot like what is happening now 222 years later.  I wonder, should Christ tarry , what will have been chronicled about us?

Stay safe and dream about that next vacation.  We may have taken the blessing of travel too lightly.  Remember, the best is yet to come!

Spring in Indiana